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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 January 2009
Most writing on the early history of the Inns of Court reflects an assumption which was very clearly stated by Sir Frederick Pollock,
On the whole then the constitution of the Inns of Court was settled about the middle of the fourteenth century on the lines which in all cssentials are much the same at this day. The only considerable formal change was that two centuries later the original governing committee of the Bench gave way to a single principal officer, the Treasurer.
1 “The Origin of the Inns of Court,” 48 L.Q.R. 166.
2 It has been challenged by S. E. Thorne, “The Early History of the Inns of Court with Special Reference to Gray's Inn,” Graya, No. 50. p. 79. and Prest, W. R., The Inns of Court under Elizabeth I and the Early Stuarts, ch. I.Google Scholar
3 “The Early Constitution of the Inns of Court,” 28 C.L.J. 241.
4 Many illustrations may be found in Hastings Rashdall. The Universities of Evrope in the Middle Ages, edited by Powicke, F. M. and Emden, A. B. (Oxford, 1936).Google Scholar
5 Fletcher, R. J., The Pension Book of Gray's Inn (London, 1901), p. 26Google Scholar (1576). hereafter cited as P.B.
6 B.M.MS. Hargrave 388 at f.122a, where John Spelman records the practice in his notebook. An edition of this MS. is in course of preparations for the Selden Society, edited by J. H. Baker.
7 See the evidence discussed in 28 C.L.J. 241 et seq.
8 The evidence is collected by Fletcher in his introduction to the Pension Book and by Williams, E., Early Holborn and the Legal Quarter of London (London 1927).Google Scholar See also Thorne, op. cit.
9 Dugdale, Origines Juridiciales, 2nd ed. (1671), p. 292.
10 Dugdale, p. 298, from f.115a of the lost volume. The latest reference to f.257b is on p. 294.
11 Dugdale, p. 299, recording the admission of Thomas Cromwell, the information being given “as appeareth in their Register.” According to Segar (Harley MS. 1912, f.4b) the first admission book ran from 1521–80.
12 Dugdale, p. 273, quotes from f.108a of the Register a decision taken on 9 July 1531 at a pension; and on p. 272 from the Steward's Accounts with a reference to the Register, ff.100a, 107b, and 130a.
13 Dugdale, p. 287, the text being taken from “a Tablet hanging up in the Hall, at Gray's Inn Ann. 1664.”
14 Bodleian MS. Rawl. Statutes, 55.
15 Dugdale, p. 273, has a reference to a Book of Rules, apparently relating to 1531. This could merely be a reference to the Register, or alternatively to some other volume.
16 Harley 1912, hereafter referred to as Segar MS.
17 See f.4b and 174b. The first person whose date of admission is known is William Yelverton II; the Yelvertons had long been associated with the Inn, and in 1589 Christopher Yelverton claimed that his family had been connected with Gray's Inn for at least 200 years. See P.B., Vol. I. xviii. This would suggest that John Yelverton, Recorder of Norwich in 1403 and father of William Yelverton (Sit. 1439, J.K.B. 1443) was the first member of the Inn from the family.
18 At f.189b. Robert Chllinor opens the list.
19 See f.173.
20 William Yelverton II is again the first known barrister of Gray's Inn; see f.174b.
21 f.237b et seq.
22 W. R. Douthwaite, Gray's Inn, Its History and Associations (London, 1886), pp. 24 et seq.
23 Dugdale, op. cit., p. 292; Thorne, Readings and Moots at the Inns of Court in the Fifteenth Century, Vol. I at p. xxxi (Selden Society, Vol. 71).
24 At f.172a.
25 On the early William of Skipwith see Selden Society, Vols. 82, 83 and 88, passim and on the fifteenth-century William Skipwith see the entry in Wedgwood, J. C., History of Parliament, Biographies of the Members of the Commons House.Google Scholar He appears in the Patent Rolls in 1469 with other lawyers on a Commission de walliis et fossatis (C.P.R. 1467–77, p. 169) and as “gentleman,” a common addition for lawyers, in the Close Rolls (C.C.R. Hen. VI, Vol. V, f.519 (1454); Vol. VI, f.116 (1456); f.223 (1457); C.C.R. Hen. VI, Vol. V. f.519 (1454); Vol. VI.116 (1456); f.223 (1457); C.C.R. Edw. IV, f.304 (1465).
26 Two MSS., Harley 2113 and 1059 note arms displayed in the Hall of Gray's Inn in the sixteenth-century, but the lists are incomplete and not helpful. MS. Harley 1042, to which Dr. J. H. Baker has called my attention, has a better list which makes it clear that the Chief Justice Markham was intended. The identification of the coats of arms in Dugdale is not always consistent, and the world of heraldry is notoriously unreliable, so that it is dubious how great a reliance can be placed on heraldic evidence.
27 Thorne, op. cit., p. xxxi, the suggested dates of their readings being 1430, 1437 (Moyle), 1437, 1445 (Billing). 1450, 1458 (Bryan), 1455, 1464 (Hussey). Thorne adduces evidence associating John Markharn (of the fifteenth-century) with Gray's Inn (see p. xx and lviii). He was born c. 1400 according to Thorne's suggestion and became a Serjeant in 1438.
28 Thorne, op. cit., p. 1 et seq. discusses the evidence, concluding that some surviving readings date from c. 1420–30.
29 See Records of the Honorable (Society of Lincoln's Inn, The Black Books, edited by J. Douglas Walker (London, 1897), Vol. I, p. 41 (1466) et passim, hereafter B.B. Furnival's Inn also had a council or grand council; see Early Records of Furnival's Inn, edited by D. S. Bland (Newcastle upon Tyne, 1957), at pp. 29, 35, hereafter F.I.R.
30 See The Middle Temple Records, Minutes of Parliament, edited by Hopwood, Charles Henry (London, 1904)Google Scholar, passim (hereafter M.T.R.). Calendar of Inner Temple Records, edited by F. A. Inderwick, London, 1896, passim (hereafter I.T.R.).
31 See Pension Book of Clement's Inn, edited by Sir Cecil Carr, Selden Society, Vol. 78, passim. The Governing Body was also called in the collected orders of the Society a Grand Council (see at pp. xiv and 223–224). Carr is mistaken in supposing that the term “Grand Company” is ever applied to a meeting of any kind; it is the collective name for the ancients.
32 Gray's Inn MS. Add. 50— The Barnard's Inn Orders of Pension, 1620–1754, passim.
33 The Inns of Court Commission (1854) mentions the existence of a Pension Room.
34 See the MS. Pension Book, Vol. I at f.lb and passim.
35 M.T.R., Vol. I. f.171. Dugdale, f.201, gives an account of the procedure at a Middle Temple Parliament in the seventeenth century (the account temp. Henry VIII ends at p. 197).
36 P.B., Vol. I, p. 3.
37 See Bodl-Lib. MS. Rawl. S. 705 at f.98b (1514?), B.M. MS. Harg. 388, f.127. I am indebted to Dr. J. H. Baker for calling my attention to these references.
37a B.B., Vol. I. p. 41.
38 B. M. MS. Harley 1912 at f.174b.
39 This is based on the Segar MS. lists, which record Flynt as being admitted in 1532, called to be ancient in 1547, and bencher in 1549; possibly this is merely an error. Segar also includes in his lists one Thomas Daniel; the date of admission is blank but he is recorded as ancient in 1528. A space is left for a date as bencher, but this again is blank. Again I suspect a mere error.
40 Segar lists him as admitted in 1532, called to the bar in 1533, ancient in 1540.
41 P.B., Vol. I, P. 42.
42 P.B., Vol. I, P. 72.
43 e.g. P.B., Vol. I, pp. 145, 181.
44 P.B., Vol. I, pp. 181 (1608), 194 (1611), 197 (1612), 215 (1614), 232 (2 persons, 1618), 233 (1618), 273 (1626, the King's Carver), 278 (1627), 281 (1629), 299 (1630).
45 P.B., Vol. I, p. 215.
46 See P.B., Vol. I, pp. 380, 420. For an earlier example see p. 370.
47 P.B., Vol. II, p. 47.
48 P.B., Vol. II, p. 57.
49 See 28 C.L.J. 255. The account (temp. Hen. VIII) in Dugdale at pp. 193 et seq. makes it clear that readers and benchers were the same people, i.e., the the function of sitting on the bench in moots belonged to the readers. There are hints of the existence of a category of “elders”(i.e., ancients) but no indication of a formalised call.
50 M.T.R., Vol. I, p. 150, indicate the survival of some democratic control over call to the bar into the Elizabethan period. See also at p. 83.
51 I.T.R., p. 239.
52 I.T.R., p. 7 (1506) records the call to the bench of Edward Tame; he never read.
53 I.T.R., p. 39.
54 I.T.R., pp. 60,66,68, Dugdale, p. 163.
55 For references to the grand company see for example P.B., Vol. I, pp.16 (1575), 27 (1576), 28 (1577), 35 (1579), 60 (1584).
55a M.T.R., Vol. I, p. 8 (1503), Dugdale, op. cit., pp. 192 et seq. The references may merely be to the older masters,
56 P.B., Vol. I, p. 93 (1591).
57 P.B., Vol. I, p. 148 (1600), Dugdale, p. 288 and Bodl. MS. Rawl. Statutes, 55 at f.2 (The Ancient Standing Orders).
58 Based on the Segar MS.
59 P.B., Vol. II, p. 152.
60 P.B., Vol. I, P. 63.
61 P.B., Vol. I, p. 100.
62 P.B., Vol. I, p. 131.
63 P.B., Vol. I, p. 162.
64 Dugdale, p. 291.
65 Segar MS., f.238b.
66 Dugdale, op. cit., pp. 174, 288, Segar MS., f.238b.
67 Dugdale, op. cit., p. 275 and P.B., Vol. I, p. 262.
68 B.B., Vol. I, p. 41
69 Dugdale, op. cit., p. 289. The date of this order is not clear.
70 Segar MS., f.238b.
70a B.B., Vol. I, p. 188.
71 Admissions are recorded from 1521 at f.4b—earlier admissions are occasionally referred to, elsewhere in the MS. Except where a reference is given what follows is based on the Segar MS.
72 Nicholas Bacon, admitted in 1532, was called to the bar one year later; two years was a common period.
73 Dugdale, Chronica Series, p. 87.
74 See the entry in E. Foss, A Biographical Dictionary of the Judges of England (London, 1870), under the alternative spelling Staunford. Foss has the date of his call to the bar wrongly.
75 Dugdale, Chronica Series, p. 91.
76 Snagge in 1580 and Yelverton in 1589 (Dugdale, pp. 89 and 97).
77 See his entry in Foss. He died in 1612.
78 F.I.R. (ed. Bland), passim. In the fifteenth century members of the Inn were called socit (fellows) (see p. 26) and the meetings of the governing body a concilium (p. 29) or Grand Conseil (p. 35). The earliest reference to the “Grand Company” is in 1541 (p. 41 and see p. 42). The surviving extracts from the lost records do not mention ancients eo nomine, but in Edw. VI's reign there is a list of the principal and nine “Masters of this House to governe…” That they were called ancients is attested by B.B., Vol. I, pp. 333, 355.
79 The Paston letters in 1471 (Supplement p. 139) mention the principal of the Inn; for the ancients see P.B., Vol. I, p. 98.
80 P.B., Vol. I, p. 88. Barnard's Inn had a principal in 1447, as appears from the Calendar of Plea and Memoranda Rolls (London), p. 99. See also Dugdale, p. 310.
81 See Carr, S.S., Vol. 78, at p. xiv.
82 Clifford's Inn in the fourteenth century had a principal and council, as appears from the Statutes in the possession of the Inner Temple. The members of the council were called seniors in Henry VIII's time—see Dugdale, p. 187.
83 The Order printed in I.T.R., Vol. I, p. 194 (1557) assumes that all Inns of Chanoery had a principal and ancients.
84 Report of the Inns of Court Commission, p. 84, 66.
85 Ibid., p. 82. According to an MS. account of the Inns by Sir Robert Brerewood (now in the possession of the Middle Temple) Lyon's Inn had originally a treasurer, not a principal. See f.200.
86 Ibid., p. 89. The officers were a treasurer and pensioner,
87 Ibid., p. 92.
88 Ibid., p. 87.
89 Carr, op. cit., p. lxvi.
90 Printed by G. W. Sanders, Orders of the High Court of Chancery, Vol. I, p. 1. The possible exception is Lyon's Inn. See n. 85.
91 See above n. 33.
92 See above n. 28 for the earliest readings found. It is of course always possible that the typical readings based on the text of Statutes superseded other forms of reading which would give rise to different surviving MSS, but I know of no evidence fox this possibility in the fourteenth century.
93 P.B., Vol. I, p. 126.
94 Dugdale, p. 310.
95 Thus the form of legislation is “Be it ordained for various causes moving the Readers.” P.B., Vol. I, p. 3.
96 E.g., P.B., Vol. I, p. 7.
97 Nicholas Bacon became treasurer in 1552; he was never a reader. However the Segar MS. lists him as bencher in 1550, and probably he was given the status of reader but dispensed from the duties. In 1555 he was joined in the office with a genuine reader, William Gerrard.
98 Dugdale, p. 298. From the Segar MS. it appears that William Walsyngham became an ancient in 1522 and read as lent reader in 1530, being elected treasurer the following year.
99 Dugdale, p. 298, P.B., Vol. I, p. 21.
1 E.g., P.B., Vol.I, p. 4, 6.
2 P.B., Vol. I, p. 299.
3 P.B., Vol. I, p. 325.
4 P.B., Vol. I, p. 336.
5 P.B., Vol. I, p. 361.
6 The well known report by Thomas Denton, Nicholas Bacon and Robert Cary, compiled c. 1534–47 and republished in J.S.P.T.L. (N.S.) 178 by D. S. Bland states that in all Inns the Membership was divided into, “Benchers, or as they call them in some houses, readers, utter barristers and inner barristers.” This is plainly inaccurate. The report also given an account of the system of government which may be intended to refer to that obtaining in Gray's Inn, there described as the “Sage Company.” The difficulty about the report is that it conflates the arrangements in the various Inns in a confusing way which makes it difficult to tell how far to trust the account except as a generalised treatment.
7 I am much indebted to Dr. J. H. Baker for reading this article in typescript and making various suggestions for its improvement.
